Appeal No. 2002-1399
Application No. 09/121,254
Claims 1-5 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over
Yaker.
We refer to the Final Rejection (Paper No. 10) and the Examiner’s Answer
(Paper No. 15) for a statement of the examiner’s position and to the Brief (Paper No.
14) and the Reply Brief (Paper No. 16) for appellants’ position with respect to the claims
which stand rejected.
OPINION
Yaker discloses a voice messaging system 100 (Fig. 1) capable of storing voice
messages, in compressed digital format, in memory 108. Col. 2, ll. 12-32. “Memory
108 may be any suitable device for storing voice messages, including magnetic tape
recorders and computer memory devices, such as hard drives and random access
memory (RAM).” Id. at ll. 42-46.
As shown in the flowchart of Figure 2, system 100 queries a caller for a time for
retaining the current message. According to Yaker, allowing the caller to specify a
retention time avoids filling the system’s memory with irrelevant messages. The system
automatically deletes the voice message if the time expires before the message is
retrieved by the “callee.” If the caller does not specify a desired retention time, system
100 preferably provides a default retention time, which “could be to store a message
indefinitely.” Col. 2, l. 55 - col. 3, l. 18.
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